Change In Plans

VEILED WOMEN AND BABY IN VARANASI

Greetings from Cape Town.  Our days in Cape Town continue to be not very noteworthy, so this post is about the role of women in Indian society.  Everything in Indian society seemed complex, and few things seemed generalizable across the entire country.  That said, the role of women was particularly difficult for me to understand.  Women seem to be treated unfairly by a large segment of society, and in many cases, just badly.  For example:

• the dowry system (which makes girl children a big financial burden)
• lingering societal enthusiasm for the now obsolete practice of sati, when the living widow throws herself onto the cremation pyre of her husband
• widely acknowledged gender-selected abortion and female infanticide
• societal exclusion of widows (eg, from religious festivals)
• “honor killings” of women who have been raped or had out-of-wedlock sex (relatively uncommon)
• female adult literacy of ~40%, vs, male adult literacy of nearly 60%
• expectations of very conservative dress, including head covering and veils in many cases, for both Hindu and Muslim women

At the same time, women are also idealized and exalted:

• The “five mothers” (birth mother, cow mother, Mother Ganga, mother Earth, and Mother Om) at the center of Hinduism
• Proliferation of powerful female Hindu goddesses (eg, Kali, the ferocious destroyer)
• Success of many female politicians across multiple parties
• Societal obsession with Bollywood actresses

To highlight the paradoxes, and as a testament to my confusion, I tried to summarize all of the women-related stories in the Times of India on November 20th.  The few Indians who I have discussed this topic with say that “these newspaper stories aren’t representative” for a variety of reasons.  I invite you to read the summaries and to draw your own conclusions:

Story 1 - an update on the “sex ratio” in Gurgaon, a wealthy suburb of Delhi.  ”Sex ratio” means the number of girl births registered per thousand boy births.  The natural rate is about 950, so Gurgaon’s rate of 847 implies that about 11-12% of all girl-fetus pregnancies are terminated (and/or infant girls are killed).  Sex ratio is such a commonly used term that it was not defined in the story.  This is an ongoing and closely tracked issue across India.  It will be interesting to see what societal changes come about from the demographic inevitability of having ~100 million young adult men in a giant, unmarryable bachelor herd in about 20 years.  If markets work, dowry prices should go down.  Let’s hope that the outcome is not much worse.

Story 2 - a Delhi pedestrian saw a stray dog dragging a plastic bag around, and discovered a living five-day-old girl child in the bag.  Police described this as “a pretty common thing.”  The infant survived.

Story 3 - undercover women police officers have been deployed at the Indian International Trade Fair to reduce the incidence of “Eve teasing,” which is an aggressive form of public harassment.  The commander of the unit said that the officers get the offenders to “apologize, or we bash him in front of his friends.” Police say that  women from the Northeast parts of India are seen as “easy targets” for Eve teasing, because they are “too soft spoken to retort” 

Story 4 - about upcoming local elections, where two of the three party leaders (Gandhi from Congress, Mayawati from BSP) are women

Story 5 - a regular feature called “Woman on Top,” which details triumphs of women.  This column was about a woman in the U.S. who won a sexual harassment lawsuit.

Story 6 - a long feature story on the difficulties that expat wives have in getting legal permission to work in India.  The story suggested that it was so difficult that they should give up, enjoy being in India, and raise their children.

FIRE DANCER IN JAIPUR

Story 7 - short profiles of women political candidates in Kashmir, summarized in a table of characteristics of Kashmiri women (From: uneducated, politically unaware, unemployed, and possessing low self esteem, To: educated, politically aware, employed, confident)

Story 8 - entitled “My Wife, My Trophy,” which argues, in earnest, for “a truth, universally acknowledged, that a rich man needs a beautiful, young wife”

Story 9 - a weird science story, citing a study that demonstrated that the use of hairspray by pregnant women increases the risk significantly of “genital defects” in boy children.

Story 10 - entitled “Macho Girls,” which claims that Indian women are “assertive and hard as nails” and have “Learned to talk tough and walk rough.” This story had a lot of hot photos of beautiful young women.

Story 11 - entitled “Sexy Is In the Mind,” with a racy picture of Eva Longoria, and the recommendation that overweight women should “tell themselves they are slim.”

Obviously, it is difficult to draw any conclusions from some personal observations and a bunch of newspaper stories.  India’s long-term success, however, seems closely connected to greatly normalizing the role of women, or at least not treating them so generally badly.  

Thinking about this topic made me for sure appreciate my strong mother and sister, and my strong wife.  It also made me appreciate more the accomplishments of prominent and successful Indian women.

WOMEN THRESHING GRAIN

EXTRANEOUS PICTURE OF ZOLA SHREDDING AGAIN

Greetings from Cape Town.  Until we do something more interesting than surf, hike, and go to playgrounds, I was planning to catch up on some of the blog posts from other places, that I wanted to write earlier in the trip.  Sorry for putting things out of chronological order.  By the way, the surfing in Muizenberg today was off-the-charts great.  India (the person) was so inspired that she bought a wetsuit, and is starting lessons later in the week.

This post is about the books that India (the person) and/or I read while we were in India (the place).  We ran around a lot, and had less time to read than I would have expected.  The books we did get through definitely had an impact on the questions we asked, the details we observed, and our perceptions of India. Our reading list, in roughly chronological order, was:

“In Spite of the Gods” by Edward Luce (Non-fiction, published ~2005).  The author was a Financial Times correspondent in India for four or five years.  He described the problems and opportunities in India’s development process very clearly.  This definitely helped us understand and probe some of the the tensions in contemporary India (e.g., Hindu vs. Muslim, North vs. South, India vs. Pakistan, caste system, urban vs. rural).  Good book.

“May You be the Mother of a Hundred Sons” by Elisabeth Bumiller (Non-fiction, published ~1988).  Elisabeth Bumiller has gone on to become a hugely accomplished senior correspondent at the New York TImes.  She wrote this book in her late 20s, when she and her husband were living in India.  The book focuses on the role of women in Indian society.  India (the person) found her style to be a little angsty and self-referential, but we learned a lot, and started thinking and asking questions about the role of women.  This book definitely sparked a lot of good conversations between us.

“A Year in the World” by Frances Mayes (Non-fiction, published in ~2004).  Frances Mayes wrote the wildly popular book, “Under the Tuscan Sun” and a few sequels.  I read this book in my efforts to become a better travel writer.  Frances Mayes is a poet, and she writes beautifully.  I came to the conclusion that I am not her target audience: too many lavish descriptions of food and gardens, too many references to romantic literature, and generally too many adjectives.  I was also surprised because the “year in the world” was really a series of short trips in Western Europe.  She doesn’t seem particularly adventurous.  That said, her books sell a bazillion copies, and the writing is much better than anything I can ever hope to accomplish.

‘White Tiger” by Arvind Adiga (Fiction, published 2008).  This stylized novel is about an amoral Indian man, who escapes rural poverty in the north and becomes a Bangalore entrepreneur.  ”White Tiger” won the Man Booker prize just before we arrived in India, and it seemed that 25% of all tourists we saw were reading it simultaneously.  India (the person), and Indrajit, our guide, and I all thought it was phenomenally good.  Arvind Adiga’s writing is evocative and engaging, the story is perfectly paced, the protagonist/anti-hero is well developed.  It will be a classic of Indian magical realism.  Great book.

“A Year in Provence” by Peter Mayle (Non-fiction, published in ~1990).  This was another part of my autodidactic travel-writing education.  It is a slickly written and entertaining book, but light as a feather.  The overall theme seemed to be: “These Provencaux are just so wacky, but I love ‘em, and no other outsiders understand them the way that I do.”  Again, Peter Mayle must be doing something right, because so many people like and buy his books.  Good on him.

“Elephanta Suites” by Paul Theroux (Fiction, published ???).  India (the person) really liked this book of short stories, set in contemporary India.  She referred to places and situations in it frequently as we travelled.  Unfortunately,  I haven’t gotten to it yet.

“Midnight’s Children” by Salman Rushdie (Fiction, published ~1982).  This is a truly outstanding book, totally deserving of the award for being the “best of the Booker Prize winners.”  It sets the standard for Indian fiction (Arvind Adiga owes a small debt to Salman Rushdie, I think), and is just an awesome achievement.  Being in India made the novel’s historical sweep and its dense web of cultural references resonate much more than when I read it 10 years ago.

“Divisadero” by Michael Ondaatje (Fiction, published ??). This is a sad novel set in California, and doesn’t have much to do with India (the place). India (the person) bought it in an airport, and liked it a lot.  Michael Ondaatje is a great writer, but this is not an uplifting story.  I am about halfway through it, but got distracted.

EXTRANEOUS PICTURE OF TALLULAH THE PRE-TEEN

“India - an Eyewitness Guide” (Non-fiction, published 2007).  This is the Dorling-Kindersley guide to India.  It has great pictures and diagrams, and tons of clearly conveyed information.  Because we knew where we were staying and eating in India, this was helpful for background information.

“The Age of Kali” by William Dalrymple (Non-fiction, published ~1998).  Many, many Indians recommended this book.  William Dalrymple is an excellent journalistic writer, and he writes about interesting topics, based on his bravely gathered first-hand experiences.  The “age of Kali” is similar to the “end-of-days” concept amongst fundamentalist Christians, and basically describes a society which is disintegrating from corruption, venality, violence, and bad behavior.  This is also not an uplifting book.  That said, it is 10 years old, and many of the societal problems he describes (e.g., caste warfare, graft and corruption, violent fundamentalism, profound misogyny) seem to have improved during that time.  Definitely worth reading.

“The Moor’s Last Sigh” by Salman Rushdie (Fiction, published ~1998). If anything, this is even better than “Midnight’s Children.”  Salman Rushdie’s ability to evoke grand themes of social relevance, his cleverness and word play, and his storytelling are all pretty much unparalleled.  This is another truly remarkable book.  As with “Midnight’s Children”, it was great to read “Moor’s Last Sigh” while we were in India.  For example, one of the critical scenes takes place in the ancient synagogue on Jewtown Road in Kochi.  We had been in the same synagogue a few days before I read that scene, which brought his great descriptions to life.

While India (the person) and I were reading these books, Zola devoured about a dozen young-adult chapter books about Indian myths, gods, and religious stories.  These books generally had a lot of fighting, and heads being chopped off, and Zola loved them.  I was amazed at how much he learned and retained about the various Hindu gods and goddesses, and how he could connect the stories to paintings and shrines and statues that we saw.  

Zola also read about half a dozen Asterix books, plus “Tom Sawyer” by Mark Twain and “Farmer Boy” by Laura Ingalls Wilder.  To his mother’s chagrin, Zola also spent countless hours memorizing facts from his “Field Guide to Pokemon.”  We are not sure how any of these relate to traveling in India.

Tomorrow we have a busy day in Cape Town.  We are interviewing a potential nanny/tutor who would accompany us for a while.  We have family haircuts scheduled, and have a lot of Christmas and birthday shopping to do.  We also need to settle into our new rental house down in Llandudno and stock up on supplies.  If the waves are good again, though, all bets are off, and we will be surfing.

EXTRANEOUS PICTURE OF DAD AND LU HAVING FUN AT LUNCH

THE COMPLEAT ANGLER

Greetings from Delhi!  We flew here this evening after spending a terrific final day down in Kochi.  Tomorrow morning we say goodbye to India (the place), and board a plane for Kathmandu, Nepal.  This post, however, is about Kochi.

We spent the morning swimming in the pool at the Brunton Boatyard Hotel, and waiting for the second-place competitor in the Volvo Ocean Race to sail past us.  The leaders (Team Ericsson) went right past our hotel room windows at 5:30 this morning, but we were all asleep. In the 10,000 nautical miles since the boats left Cape Town, they have gotten so dispersed that we didn’t actually see anyone come through.  It was fun, though, watching for them and talking about the race.

In the afternoon, we had a terrific local guide named Anuja Skaria take us around old Kochi. Anuja showed us a lot in a few short hours, and had thoughtful answers to all of my amateurish “Kerala Paradox” questions.   

Our first stop was the St. Francis of Assissi Church, which has a history that parallels the involvement of the European powers in Kochi.  A wooden Catholic church was first built by the Portuguese in 1502.  After Vasco da Gama died in Kochi, his body was buried at the church for several years, before being taken to Portugal.  The Dutch took over the church, along with the rest of Kochi, in the 1660s.  They burned the Portuguese church, built a more permanent multi-gabled structure, and repurposed it for the Dutch Reformed Church. The British took over the colony and the church in the 1790s, and converted the parish to Anglicanism.  When the Communist Party of India (Marxist) took control of Kerala in the late 1950s, they decided that the Anglicans could stay.

From the church, we walked along the beach and the sea wall to the row of Chinese fishing nets.  We had been admiring these structures from afar, but with Anuja’s encouragement we walked out onto one of the rigs and offered to help out for a while.

The fishing technique was introduced to Kochi by Chinese traders 400 years ago.  It is pretty simple: submerge the massive net, wait for the tide to bring some fish past, lift the net out of the water and take the fish.  We helped raise and lower the net three times; Zola, Tallulah and me pulling on the ropes alongside the real fishermen.  As we all pulled, they chanted “Ahj … Ahjella! Ahj … Ahjella!,” which may be the Malayalam expression for “Thank you, silly foreigners!” 

Both kids were very excited to see what we caught with each raising of the net.  Cycle #2 yielded about 30 silver mullet fish, each about 5 inches long.  Cycles #1 and 3 each produced only a single, very small mullet.  (Tallulah is holding one of the unfortunates in the picture at the top of the post).  They all got thrown into a water bucket, to be sold at an open-air auction later in the afternoon. 

Anuja took us to the inaccurately named Dutch Palace, which was built originally by the Portuguese as a gift to the local maharajah. The Kochi palace is relatively small and modestly decorated, compared with the massive and elaborate palaces of the Rajasthani kings.  The highlight is a huge (300 meters long, 2 meters high) detailed fresco of the 2,500-year-old Ramayana epic, the story at the the core of Indian culture.  The fresco is badly preserved (must be tough in the Kerala heat and humidity), but must have been spectacular when it was new. 

Finally, we went to the Kochi synagogue, built in the early 1500s, and still in use today.  As we found out, it is the oldest synagogue in the British Commonwealth, and one of only four known synagogues in the world to have two pulpits.  The history of Jews in Kochi dates back to the first century AD, when a group from Jerusalem found refuge after the Romans sacked and occupied the holy city.  The population was increased dramatically in the 15th century, as Spanish and Portuguese Jews fled the Inquisition.  Most of the community emigrated (back?) to Israel in the last 60 years, so the population has dwindled to 11 elderly survivors, and only 7 men.  In order to read from the Torah (needing at least 10 men), the congregation has to be supplemented by visitors.  Kerala has a complicated history, but it’s interesting.

After Anuja left us, we sat on the balcony of the Malabar House hotel, and drank a milkshake and Diet Pepsi toast to Kochi, to Kerala, and to India itself.  Our afternoon exploring old Kochi was a great way to cap our four weeks in India.

SUNSET CRUISE ON VEMBANAD LAKE

Greetings from Fort Cochin, Kerala. We cancelled our plans to go to Mumbai, and are spending our final few days in India laying low in Kerala. This short post describes what we are doing, and how we have been feeling in the strange days since the terror attacks started in Mumbai on Wednesday night.

We left Fort Cochin for the first time on Thursday morning, driving about 60 minutes to get on a houseboat in Alleppey.  Originally we were supposed to stay on the houseboat until Friday morning, and then fly up to Mumbai.  For obvious reasons, we changed those plans.  Instead, on Friday morning we had the houseboat motor across the massive Vembanad Lake, and deliver us dockside to the Kumarakom Lake Resort.  

KLR, as everyone seems to call it, is a very elegant, comfortable resort about 60 km inland from Kochi.  It was rated “India’s Top Resort” in 2006 and 2007, which is pretty strong.  The staff seemed a little surprised to see us, but they assigned us a little pink bungalow, and welcomed us graciously.  We sent the kids to a pottery workshop, rode bikes in the late-afternoon heat, and went for a sunset cruise on the lake.  Mostly, though, we sat in the sunshine and read on-line reports of the ongoing battle for Mumbai.  

This morning India and I each went out for a run in the village near KLR.  The village is mostly composed of a network of 8-foot-wide asphalt paths, which run parallel to a network of small canals.  The houses are generally connected to the paths by little bridges across the canal (usually just two logs side by side).  There are no cars, except on the main road.   People seem to use the fresh canal water for transportation, for household water, for bathing, and for recreation.  Like everything we have seen in Kerala, though, the houses and the public spaces in the village are clean and well maintained.  Although the brutal heat, and the closeness of the lush jungle feel a little oppressive, we understand why so many foreign tourists rave about visiting Kerala.

Late this afternoon we drove back to Fort Cochin to check back in to the Brunton Boatyard hotel.  The hotel is a reconstruction of a famous old shipyard, and is located right next to Kochi harbor.  From the windows of the hotel, huge freighters and tankers motor past us on their way to the docks.  It is similar to being on the Bosphorous in Istanbul.  To our left, the spidery outlines of the “Chinese fishing nets” look beautiful in the fading light.

CHINESE FISHING NETS

There is a small local ferry that operates from a dock 30 feet from our window.  Throughout the day, it makes several trips each hour across the straits that separate Fort Cochin from the Vypin district about a kilometer away.  Just before sunset, Zola and Tallulah indulged my curiosity about the ferry, and joined me on a quick round trip.  The cost was 24 U.S. cents (combined).  On the return trip we counted 70 foot passengers, 8 cars and small trucks, 8 motor rickshaws, and 33 motorcycles/scooters and their riders, all packed into a space the size of two suburban living rooms.  I was glad that the ferry captain avoided contact with the big vessels in the channel, because I didn’t see any life jackets on board.  On both legs of our round trip, the foot passengers started jumping ashore even before the ferry had stopped moving.  In Kerala, people have places to go and things to do.

Tomorrow evening we fly up to Delhi, and on Monday morning we leave for Kathmandu.  

It feels as though we have been traveling in India for a long time, and that we have seen a lot.  To be honest, we are all feeling emotionally exhausted and a little ragged.

The experience has definitely given us plenty to think about and to process in the coming weeks.  It is probably the single most interesting country I have visited in my life.  

Even despite the Mumbai attacks, India feels like a place we could live and be happy as a family.  Maybe that is just prestalgia talking, but we will re-evaluate in the weeks and months to come.

A KERALA HOUSEBOAT

Greetings from Alleppey, Kerala, in the steamy far south of India. This was a strange day.  Our minds were largely focused on the attacks in Mumbai, while our bodies rode around in a rattan houseboat in Kerala’s “Backwaters” district.

OUR KERALA HOUSEBOAT AND JUNIOR HOUSEBOATERS

This post is mostly about Kerala, where we have been since yesterday morning. India is a confusing place for a foreigner.   The state of Kerala is more confusing than the national average
.

There is actually something that economists call “the Kerala Paradox.”  It refers to the state’s very high rankings on quality-of-life indicators (e.g., high literacy, low infant mortality, high caloric intake, practically zero homelessness) but pedestrian economic growth from independence until the late 1990.

As far as I can tell, the high quality-of-life rankings come from Kerala’s long history of income equality, enlightened maharajas, and the outside influences of Europeans and Arabs as trading partners.Comprehensive land reform and commitment to primary education (nearly 100% adult literacy) have been more recent drivers. Poor economic growth has come from politics. Although the Congress Party has ruled India overall for most of the country’s 61-year history, it has only held power in Kerala sporadically. As a semi-dissident state, Kerala has never received much investment from the center.  The business climate was also relatively hostile for much of the last 60 years: rigid labor laws, high taxes, much bureaucracy.

Kerala’s economy struggled along until about 2000, when a new (privately funded) airport was completed in Kochi, and tourism and IT started to boom. Also, highly educated emigres from Kerala to the rest of India, and to the oil-rich Gulf states, remitted loads of money, jump-starting development.

The other paradoxes of Kerala are frankly more difficult to understand. Despite its relative poverty, Kerala’s local government has a longstanding reputation for being honest, pragmatic, and tough-minded. The roads are very good,and the public spaces are clean.   Traffic lights work, and the plentiful signage and tourism sights are sponsored through advertising from local merchants (cutting-edge public-private partnership). Kerala’s investment climate is now seen as much more friendly to business. This is a state government that understands business, and consistently delivers services for its citizens.

It is paradoxical that Kerala, a relative Singapore of the sub-continent, has been run by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) for most of its history. The parenthetical Marxist reflects the feuds and fissures of the early days of the Indian left.  Kerala may have the only freely elected Communist regime in the world.  Nearly 20 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it is jarring to see the hammer and sickle painted on roadways, and emblazoned on campaign posters and flags.  That picture of Che Guevara is more than a fashion statement.

Even more paradoxical, this Communist/Hindu state’s motto is “God’s own country.” Note the capitalization and the singular form of “God.”

The Catholic missionaries did a salutary job in this part of India.  There are crosses, churches, and parochial schools everywhere. This afternoon, we left the houseboat and visited a huge old cathedral, in a parish which dates from Portuguese occupation of Kerala in the early 1500s. The frescoes and statues were garish and bloody and spectacular. As Zola said, “This feels more like Italy than India.” A genuflecting parishioner in the pew behind us summarized this religious paradox by clacking his rosary beads while chanting the classic “Ommmmmmmm” of Buddhist meditation.

Last night we went on a harbor cruise in Kochi.  As we watched a beautiful sunset over the communist/capitalist/Hindu/Catholic city, the Muslim call to prayer blared loudly from muezzins all along the waterfront, complicating our perceptions even further.

KATAHAKALI DANCER EXPRESSING STYLIZED LOVE

After the cruise, we watched an hour-long classical dance (Kathakali), which was performed by heavily made-up men, many of whom were in drag. The ancient Kathakali form is similar to Japanese kabuki, but has more martial arts, and is even more stylized, if that is possible.

Incidentally, it is brutally hot and humid here, even in late November. All painted surfaces are profoundly mildewed, and it looks as though the jungle could reclaim most of the buildings over a long weekend.  The lushness of the jungle hangs over everything, and life revolves around the freshwater canals and the ocean. The mosquitoes would be truly terrible if it weren’t for the enormous (e.g., housecat-sized) bats that patrol the night skies.

So, before today I thought I understood about 3% of India, but was learning and understanding more each day. With our brief introduction to Kerala, and (much more significantly) with the ongoing terror attacks in Mumbai which we narrowly avoided being in the middle of, I feel like I am back at square one. Also, we had been starting to feel very comfortable here in India, but now not so much.

On the positive side, Zola and Lu are back in the galley, mixing and rolling chapatis with the houseboat’s chef. We can hear them laughing as we sit on the foredeck in the evening breeze. We are about to feast on tiger prawns caught this morning, and on rice from paddies we could see before the sun set. No pumpkin pie, but maybe a saffron noodle pudding for dessert.

We are very thankful to have not been in Mumbai last night, and very thankful for the outpouring of support and love from friends and family around the world. We are most thankful for each other, and for the great blessing of this time together as a family.

Happy Thanksgiving.

We found out about the terror attacks when our brother-in-law called our hotel room before 6am. No idea how he found us (cell phones were all off), but glad that he did.

We are all safe, staying in Kochi, about 1,000 miles from Mumbai. We were in Mumbai on Tuesday night, but flew down here early yesterday morning.  We were booked to fly back to Mumbai and stay at the Taj Mahal hotel on Friday and Saturday nights. These terror attacks feel way too close for comfort.

Suddenly my ill-informed little observations on Indian society, and my recounting of “cute things our kids do and say” don’t seem like so much fun anymore.

We are figuring out what to do next, and laying low in the meantime. Our plans for a weekend in Mumbai, a dinner party with old friends, seeing the sights, don’t look likely. We may stay down in Kerala, or may go up to Nepal a few days early. Plans are changing.

On this Thanksgiving morning, we feel like we are very far from home. We are very thankful for each other, and for our friends and family around the world. We are also thankful that we didn’t arrive in Mumbai two days earlier.

We are sorry if any of you have worried about us. We are a little freaked out, but otherwise fine.

Peter & India (the person)
Zola & Tallulah

Greetings from Kerala. We got here after spending an unexpected night in Mumbai. Fortunately, we were at a hotel which rates 11 out of 10 on the scale of our glamour-loving eight-year-old son. This short post is about our trip from Agra, the change in plans, and the hotel.

It was bound to happen that we would eventually miss a flight. In this case, I misremembered the departure time from Agra we had agreed with Indrajit (he said 7:30, I heard 8 am), we lingered far too long at a mid-point pit stop, and the traffic in Delhi was unbelievably bad. Net-net, we arrived for our 2pm flight at about 2:30pm.

We could get a later flight as far as Mumbai, but there were no later connections available to Kochi, which is another 1,500 km south. India is the 7th biggest country in the world by land mass. The next best option was to stay overnight at an airport hotel in Mumbai, and take a 5:45 am flight to Kochi the next day.

At Delhi airport we said goodbye to Indrajit, who has been our friend, companions, and guide extraordinaire for the last three weeks. We will miss him. We also thanked and said goodbye to Syndo, who has been the travel agent on the ground in India, making all of our arrangements.

When we arrived in Mumbai, we piled ourselves and our luggage into two small SUVs for the drive to the hotel. This alone was a little comical, because the hotel ended up being about 300 yards from the terminal. The drive there took all of 90 seconds. Don’t get too comfortable, kids.

The hotel is the Sahara Airport, a brand-new five-story circular building with a dome roof over the center. As we checked in, I saw our son, Zola, getting more and more excited. He has never been to Las Vegas, but he was finally seeing some Vegas-style hotel glitz.

“Dad, did you hear that they have a laser light show at 7:30, 8:30, and 9:30?”

“Yes, Zola”

“Dad, did you hear that they have ten restaurants? Dad, ten restaurants.”

“Yes, Zola.”

“Dad, did you know that there is an indoor aquarium, with sharks and everything in it?”

“Yes, Zola. Did you hear that the sharks particularly like to eat 8-year-old boys?”

When we got to the room, I thought the kid would faint from excitement. The room itself is modishly circular, with a domed ceiling (weird acoustics). We have a glass-railed balcony facing inward toward the circle of other rooms, with the restaurants and the aquarium far below. We can even watch the laser show from out there. The bathroom is glass-walled, but has a curtain that rolls down at the push of a button. There is a huge flat-screen plasma TV.

Most important, there is a big and complicated bedside touchpad, which controls everything in the room electronically. There are pre-set lighting arrangements: “dawn,” “relax,” “party.”. There are also controls for curtains, temperature, clocks in multiple time zones, do-not-disturb lights for outside the door. There is even an electronic control to open and shut the top of the garbage can.

Zola is overwhelmed by the glory of it all, and is so happy. India (the person) and I are overwhelmed by the cheesiness of it all, and can feel the decor obsolescing, the tehnology dating, and the electronic gadgets starting to malfunction. Maybe we will stay here again in 10 years, and everything will still be awesome. More likely, it will be like a time capsule of mid-noughts Indian techno-hip.

At any rate, we didn’t have much time to enjoy it. We were out the door at 4:30 am, and on a 5:45 am flight to Kerala. I bet Zola would gladly have stayed in the Sahara Airport Hotel for the next three days, until we are back in Mumbai.

CLASSIC

Greetings from Agra, home of the Taj Mahal and a whole lot more. This post is about our time in Agra outside of seeing the Taj Mahal.

After visiting the Taj Mahal yesterday morning, we had a full day of exploring Agra. We had a handsome, lushly bearded local guide named Bilal, who asked that we call him “Haji.” He had gone to Mecca in 2003, when he was 42, and had taken on the honorific title of the pilgrim. Everywhere that we went, people shouted “Haji!” and smiled and waved. Three of his twelve brothers and sisters (and the eldest of his eight children) work in and around the Taj Mahal.

At the Taj Mahal, Haji was exceptionally good. His knowledge about, and passion for the monument were amazing. Several times, he took India’s (the person’s) camera, and posed us for the best shots.

CLASSIC HAJI-POSED SHOT

Later, Haji took us to a marble-inlay demonstration workshop in Agra. A row of young men sat and chiseled out floral patterns in table-sized marble slabs. Another row of young men sat and manually rotated “emery wheels,” which they used to shape tiny slivers of colored semi-precious stone. A host showed us how these inlays of all colors would be fixed into the marble carving with a centuries-old secret glue recipe.

Most of the craftsmen are members of the extended Shiraz family, who worked on the Taj Mahal itself 350 years ago. Boys are apprenticed for eight years,starting at about age 16. They concentrate on only a few of the classical designs until they are about 45, then they are skilled enough to make their own designs. 

CRAFTSMEN AT WORK

After seeing how the inlays were made, our host invited us into a show room full of beautiful tables, vases, trays, and chess boards. The overhead lights were dimmed, and the translucent marble of an ornate table top was illuminated to dramatic effect from underneath. Our host demonstrated the marble’s durability by dropping a table top onto its base from 6-8 inches (BANG!), and demonstrated its stain resistance by pouring Coke onto it. He assured us that it was easy and safe (and tax free!) to ship these heavy objects to the U.S. At this point, Tallulah leaned over and whispered loudly in my ear: “Let’s buy one!”

We looked for a while, and the tables were beautiful. Having no home, however, it made no sense to spend a lot of money on a table top.

After a dozen rounds of “Sorry, no thank you” followed by “But sir, have you considered …?”, our host opened the previously hidden door into another huge show room of smaller jewelry boxes and knick knacks. Ushering us in, he said, “Perhaps you would be interested in something smaller?”

We escaped fifteen minutes later, with Tallulah clutching an alabaster mini-Taj Mahal in a small gift box. I felt lucky to be only $8 poorer after all that.

From the marble store, Haji took us to a “special museum,” behind a high wall and steel gate. I was slightly suspicious when I noticed the “Koh-i-Noor Jewelers” sign on the museum door. Inside was a ground-floor display of three-dimensional tapestries. Silk thread was tied into elaborate geometric patterns, or pictures of birds and flowers. By building up thread, and bulging it away from the surface, the third dimension was added to the scenes.

We were led from the main gallery into a darkened room, with an opaque display case and several cloth sheets hanging from the walls. A small man, named Abhijay Kumar, followed us in with a device that looked like a huge TV remote control.

As Abhijay spoke to us about the art of three-dimensional tapestry, he pushed a button on the remote. The opaque display case became transparent, and a beautiful 200-year old robe was revealed. Then, Abhijay talked about the great masterpieces of three-dimensional tapestry, and one by one, as if by magic, the sheets rolled up into the walls, revealing backlit display cases with priceless tapestries within. Each new display was accompanied by different, thematically appropriate, soft music. The last display, the piece de resistance of a great silk tapestrist’s long career, was a huge scene of Christ on a hillside, surrounded by lambs. Slightly strange from a Muslim artist in central India, but nice to look at.

Overall, the craftsmanship and sheer physical effort were remarkable, and the slick remote-control light and sound show was the coolest. 3-D tapestry is not really our style, but we can appreciate it.

When we finished, Abhijay said, “As long as you are here, why don’t you come upstairs and see our 300-year-old emerald necklace?”. Of course, the emerald necklace was in the middle of a giant jewelry showroom, with thousands of necklaces, earrings, bracelets, rings, and brroches for sale. Zola desperately wanted to get his grandmother some earrings, but I gently insisted that we see the old emerald necklace and get out of there.

I had to laugh as we finally escaped to our mini-bus, and went back to the hotel for lunch. I think the average foreign tourist in Agra must be richer than us, and/or more excited about spending money on marble objects and jewelry.

After a short lunch and a long swim (Tallulah is now letting me launch her like a little cannonball in the pool), we went to tour the Agra Fort in the late afternoon. Incidentally, the old moat in front of the fort is half filled with very nasty looking water, and stinks a little.

The historical plaque outside reads, plainly “Agra Fort is the most important fort in India.” The plaque writer asserts that all other forts were less significant because the Mughal Emperors stayed at Agra, and they “ruled the country” from there. This is a strange interpretation of history: the Mughals never controlled more than about 40% of present-day India.

ZOLA AT AGRA FORT

Nevertheless, the fort was nice to look at. Haji related the history of the drunken emperor, Jehangir, who planted vineyards in the palace gardens. We saw the rooms where Shah Jehan lived out his eight years of house arrest, imposed by his son, and the window from which he could look at his beloved Taj Mahal.
Between traffic and tourism fatigue, we didn’t make it to any of the other sights in Agra. Probably our loss, but perhaps we will be back.

This morning we are driving back up to Delhi, saying goodbye to Indrajit, and flying down to Cochin, on the southwest coast of Kerala State. Agra was a wonderful part of our trip.

TRUE OR FALSE? - THE TAJ MAHAL IS ACTUALLY VERY TINY

Greetings from Agra, home of three UNESCO World Heritage Sites.  This short post is about our morning at  the Taj Mahal.

It is hard to say anything original about the beauty and grandeur of the Taj Mahal.  We came with very high expectations, and they were exceeded wildly.  The Taj Mahal  is such an iconic visual image that viewing it from a distance was too familiar to feel special.

As we walked through the spectacular red sandstone gates, we started to appreciate the genius of the architecture much more: nearly absolute symmetry along two axes, many tricks of the eye to frame and enhance the underlying beauty.  It really is an architectural masterpiece.

Once we got close to, and inside, the Taj Mahal itself we were able to appreciate the much-vaunted craftsmanship.  The decorative stone work is all chiseled out of marble, and inlaid with semi-precious stones.  The ornateness (ornatity? ornatitude?) is like nothing else we have seen anywhere, and really can not be appreciated from a distance.  It almost makes the Moroccan tilework we admired so much look simple and prefabricated by comparison.

There is nothing that I can add to the torrent of descriptive words and superlatives written about the Taj Mahal since it was completed in 1653.  More eloquent versions of the above two paragraphs could be found in any guidebook.  What might be more interesting is a series of observation-based true/false responses to prejudicial statements and questions we would have gotten from movies, TV, books, anecdotes.
.

Although the Taj Mahal itself is beautiful, the surrounding area is very dirty and rundown?  There is an open sewer running right past the grounds? - FALSE.  The grounds and the surrounding area are clean and well maintained by any standard. There is a “zero emissions zone” of golf carts and battery-powered tuk tuks for a few hundred meters outside the main gates (not sure it makes any difference, but it is a symbolic gesture).  The Yamuna River could use more water, but does not smell or appear particularly polluted.  The rest of Agra seemed no better or worse than the other small cities we have seen in India.

The Taj Mahal perfectly symmetrical along two axes?  - ALMOST TRUE.  In the entire colossal structure, the only asymmetry is the placement of Shah Jahan’s tomb just alongside his wife’s tomb (which is exactly at the center).  This seems OK, since he built it as a monument to her, and this small asymmetry in death is almost poetic.  To my totally untrained eye, everything else, down to smallest details, is symmetrical.  Cool.

Did Shah Jahan, the Mughal Emperor, get deposed, and die as a prisoner in Agra Fort? - TRUE.  Shah Jahan’s son, Aurangzeb, was a nasty piece of work.  Aurangzeb had his brothers murdered, overthrew and imprisoned his father, and then ruled the Mughal Empire with staggering incompetence.  Shah Jahan was locked in Agra Fort, but his son gave him a window with a view of the Taj Mahal.  The legend is that Shah Jahan cried so much that he ruined his eyes in six months, but that his daughter brought him a big diamond to correct his vision, so he could still see his wife’s grave.

Did Shah Jahan promise his wife on her deathbed to build the Taj Mahal? - TRUE.  Mumtaz Mahal (whose name meant “beauty of the palace”) was Shah Jahan’s third and favorite wife.  She died while giving birth to their fourteenth child.  Before she died, she asked her husband to promise three things: (1) never marry anyone else; (2) take good care of the children; (3) build a monument to their love.  He never married again, and he definitely built the monument.  Of the 14 children, only Aurangzeb and two unmarried daughters outlived Shah Jahan, so it is hard to say that he fulfilled promise #2.  Not really his fault, though.

Was there a plan to build a matching “black Taj Mahal” across the river? - TRUE.  It was supposed to be his own mausoleum, with a bridge between the two buildings, “so their soul could meet over the river at night.” Shah Jahan had started work on the foundation when his son overthrew him.

After the Taj Mahal was completed, to prevent the workers from making anything else so beautiful, were they killed, or blinded, or have their hands cut off? - FALSE.  Apparently they were paid a lot of money, but were free to do what they wanted.  The Shiraz family, which did a lot of the detailed stone inlay work, is now several-thousand strong in Agra, and making beautiful marble tables, vases, etc.

Aren’t the crowds unbelievably bad at the Taj Mahal? - FALSE. This is peak season, and it wasn’t bad at all.  Average for the year is 15,000 visitors per day, and peak (like yesterday) is about 25,000.  The space is so vast that it didn’t seem crowded at all, certainly not crowded relative to the streets of old Agra a few miles away.

Do the four minarets lean like the Tower of Pisa? - TRUE. The Turkish architect designed the minarets to lean away from the Taj Mahal, so that if they ever fell, they would not damage the main building.  This either shows incredible foresight and planning, or a real lack of confidence in the construction.  My guess is the former.  The towers lean out visibly, but have been standing for over 350 years.

Thank you for playing Taj Mahal trivia.  It is really something worth seeing live and in person.  

Today we drive back t Delhi, and fly to Kochin, way down in the South of India.  Sadly, today we also say goodbye to our great guide and friend, Indrajit.  Zola and Tallulah may choose to stay with him, and go look for tigers for the next few months.

GREETINGS FROM THE TAJ MAHAL

Greetings from Delhi.  Several months into traveling as a family, this short post is an answer to the question “how are you doing?”

Before I answer, a quick update.  It took eleven hours for us to drive and fly from Bhandavgarh National Park back to Delhi, but we are delighted to be here.  The weather was gorgeous when we landed: cool and sunny, with blue skies and very clear air.  If it had been like this on the day of our first arrival, my initial impressions would have been more positive than they were. A mini lesson for me on jumping to conclusions.  

We have seen and done so much in the last three weeks that it seems like months, instead of weeks, since we were last here.  Zola and I went for a walk in the streets before dinner, and we were both surprised at how accustomed we have become to the crowds and the noise and the controlled chaos of India.

Several people have asked us by e-mail recently, “how are you doing?”  In a few cases, this was loving grandmotherly worry about grandchildren, but more generally friends and family were interested in how our health has been, how we were feeling, and how we were getting along with each other in a 24/7 famiy environment.

Everyone’s health has been great thus far (knock wood).  We are all physically tired from waking up at 5:30 am or earlier for six of the last seven days, and I think we are all a little emotionally tired from the sensory stimulus of being in India.  I was as sick as a proverbial dog for a couple of days while we were at the Pushkar Camel Festival, but only in the uninteresting sense that I had a cold and a cough.  All of our stomachs have been generally fine.  I may be one of the rare few people who gets measurably fatter while traveling in India: Indian food is great.  Zola has lost almost eight pounds, but this is due to his still picky (although much more adventurous than six months ago) eating habits, rather than any kind of GI distress.

We continue to feel a little overwhelmed by India, but have enjoyed our time here enormously.  It has been exotic and enriching, frequently beautiful, and always interesting.  

Zola has loved the glamour of the palaces and forts, and really enjoyed the tigers.  He has also been devouring books about Indian mythology (e.g., “Children’s Stories of Shiva the Destroyer”).  In our months of travel, his confidence and poise have come back in a way that we did not expect.  Even our homeschooling sessions have gotten dramatically better. 

Tallulah seems to be internalizing a lot of what we are seeing and doing.  In the five months since we left for Ireland on the first phase of this trip, she has grown up so much.  She gave up her imaginary friends in North Vaisa while we were in the U.S. in October, and now she gets cross with us if we mention it.  She is a happy and self-directed and opinionated and sweet (and increasingly mischievous) little person.  She has also figured out the core younger-sibling skill of getting on her brother’s nerves, when she wants to.  

Both kids have somehow become really good travelers.  We are routinely getting through five and six-hour car trips, or 12-hour flights,  without arguments, without roughhousing, and without drama. This has been a huge blessing, for us and for our fellow passengers. 

India (the person) was as happy as I have ever seen her when we were at the camel festival, and when we were tracking tigers.  All of our days in India (the place) have brought together many of the things that she loves most: being with family, traveling off the beaten path, being outdoors, meeting interesting people, looking at animals, and taking photos.  If she could run a little more frequently, and do some work which was helping people, particularly kids, she would have found perfection.

Generally speaking, I am always the most grumpy and maladjusted in our little group.  In India, though, I have been incredibly happy and relaxed.  Some of this happiness has come from getting into the rhythm of traveling together, releasing my hold on the professional world for a while, and embracing my role as Dad and travel companion.  This means holding Tallulah for hours as she sleeps and we drive around looking for tigers, and playing elaborate board games with Zola in the afternoon.  Some of the happiness is also from being here, and having my intellect and all five senses overstimulated all of the time.  Regardless of the reasons, it has been great, and has made me feel closer to my wife and to my kids than I have ever felt.

So, in answer to the question “how are you doing?” I think we are doing very well.  Thanks for asking.  India has been a wonderful part of our trip.  We look forward to our last week here, leaving for Agra tomorrow, and to Nepal beyond that.